Posts Tagged "gluten free baking"

I could sit in my kitchen and bake all day, every day in December and still not have time to make every delectable treat whose recipe has crossed my path. This year I have the additional challenge of creating gluten free treats so that SuperDad isn’t left in the proverbial Christmas dust …

I had these meringues on my list last year and never got around to them so I made it a point to give them a run this time around. This is such a simple recipe and it whips up very quickly…add to that the fact that it is a little different than the standard holiday treat and has that unique meringue texture…. I was sure it would be a winner. I was right!

The original recipe for these treats comes from the 2010 Holiday magazine. I made this recipe two times before I got it to turn out the way I wanted it to. While I love the recipe collections that Taste of Home puts out during the holidays, they often don’t come with good instructions (or I’ve just become way too spoiled by my food blogger friends who lay out wonderful details on how to make their creations!). A little trial and error and I’m excited about the results.

Triple Chocolate Kiss Meringues

Ingredients:

2 egg whites

1/4 tsp. cream of tartar

1/4 tsp. almond extract

1/2 c. sugar

1 oz. semisweet chocolate, grated

24 milk chocolate kisses

Directions:

In a small bowl ( I used my KitchenAid) beat egg whites, cream of tartar and extract on medium speed until soft peaks form. (Tip: soft peaks are distinguished by seeing the peaks gently fold over when you lift the beater out of the bowl)

Gradually add sugar, 1 Tbsp. at a time, beating on high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form and sugar is dissolved. (Tip: stiff peaks are distinguished by peaks that do not move when the beater is removed from the bowl or when the bowl is gently shaken.) Do not overbeat.

Pipe 24 1 – 1½in circles onto a parchment lined baking sheet. Make sure that there is a nice pillow of meringue to create the bottom of your kisses.

Place a chocolate kiss on each circle.

Starting at the bottom of each kiss, pipe a continuous circle until the chocolate kisses are completely covered; about 2 ½ turns.

Dust with baking cocoa.

Bake at 325° for 15-18 minutes of until the edges are lightly browned. Immediately remove to wire rack.

Tip: Don’t overcook these, it will make the meringues difficult to lift off of the baking sheet. I used a metal bar server and a butter knife to lift the meringues and get them onto the cooling racks. If your base was not full enough, you may find the chocolate kiss has become the bottom of the treat and the top lifts off. This is okay…they still taste magnificent

These meringues have an amazing chocolate flavor, they are slightly crunchy and the chocolate in the middle stays soft and gooey long after the meringue has cooled.

The original recipe calls for a “medium star tip” and has a batch count of 48. I tried this and frankly, they looked like little piles of poo…the tip was too thin! The 1M makes a nice full shape but it greatly decreases your batch size. Have no fear, they are still small enough to fit in a 6 year old’s mouth in one giant bite

Rumor has it you can freeze meringues and pull them out when you are ready to serve them…. if I can ever keep these in my house long enough to get them frozen, I’ll let you know.

Throughout the month of October SuperDad and I have been conducting a little experiment: eliminating gluten from his diet to see if it helped with some major pain and discomfort that he has been increasingly suffering over the past year.

The result? He lost more than 15lbs and, without going into way too many personal details, he feels 100x better.

So now that he sees the proof in the gluten free pudding, the challenge is for me to provide him a healthy gluten free diet, rather than him simply excluding foods that he normally eats.

I’m not much of a “buy it pre-packaged” kinda gal…so I’ve been reading up on how to incorporate this style of eating into our life without buying lots of “substitutes”. Among the myriad of new recipes I’ve found to incorporate into our meal planning, I’ve also been thinking about the many, many things I cook and bake that he loves that have flour in them…and wondering how I can tweak them.

I’m so lucky to be part of a great group of Kansas City area bloggers that gets together to enjoy each other’s company and benefit from each of our individual areas of expertise. One such blogger is Johnna Perry from In Johnna’s Kitchen (Side note: You absolutely MUST go read her “About Me” page because I think it is one of the coolest becoming-a-blog stories…as well as an amazing ongoing project). Johnna is a vegetarian baker who also eats, and bakes, gluten free. So who do YOU think I went to for advice??

Tonight I put together Johnna’s “Go To” flour substitute: a combination of White Rice Flour, Brown Rice Flour, Potato Starch and Tapioca Starch. This is similar to several other suggestions I’ve read around the web but, well, I know Johnna so I’m going to trust her recipe above all else. The idea is that this combination will substitute out cup for cup with all purpose flour in most recipes (the general rule of thumb being that it works best in recipes consisting of 2c or less of flour).

It is a very busy week here…but I’m hoping to give this a roll with some amazing pumpkin pancakes I made for the kids and some jalapeno cheddar corn bread that he has been craving when we eat chili later this week… I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes.